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Prey 14.1
Prey 14.1 is the first chapter of Prey. Taylor talks to Rachel and Brian, the Undersiders and Travelers talk to Cherish, are told Siberian is a projection. Plot Taylor wakes up and finds herself lying against Brian, who is already awake. After an awkard initial exchange, Brian explains that he didn't sleep but was 'okay' with Taylor sleeping against him. She briefly worries about how to help him without touching too much on his recent experience and settles on making him coffee. In the Kitchen, Taylor talks to Aisha and Alec about Brian. Aisha is confrontational about the possibility Taylor is using this incident as an excuse to get closer to Brian, but Alec is more understanding of why Brian may want the body contact after a bad day, citing examples from his days with Heartbreaker. Both Taylor and Aisha show visible disgust regarding Heartbreaker. Taylor muses how damaged many of the Undersiders, including herself, are as people. Lisa and Rachel return from patrol, with Lisa bringing Taylor's new glasses, and the Travelers wake up shortly after. As the Travelers are preparing their breakfast, Taylor asks Bitch what Bastard is, and at Aisha's questioning specifies that she doesn't mean the breed. Bitch reveals that he is a wolf and that he was given to her by Siberian. Taylor questions how Siberian told Bitch she was being nominated for the Nine, and Bitch explains that she talked to her, something the other Undersiders all note as strange due to Siberians well known muteness. Lisa voices concerns about the Nine having put a tracking device on Bastard, but Bitch is insistant that Siberian's words were too understanding of Bitch and it doesn't add up. Lisa proposes that Siberian is an actor, intentionally acting more animalistic and hiding thigns from her team. When Trickster asks about her meaning, Lisa points out that Brian copied someones power to create the figure that he killed Burnscar with, making it possible that SIberian is a projection with a normal, vunerable body elsewhere. Bitch continues to refuse these possibilities, however Tayor proposes that they get in contact with Cherish to get a definite answer. Lisa heads into another room to phone up Coil. Taylor offers Bitch more food, but Bitch instead questions what Taylor said the previous night about helping any other Undersider just as readily as she helped Brian. Taylor confirms this, explaining that she sees Bitch as a friend irrespective of how Bitch considers her, and she won't be concerned by anything Bitch does so long as it doesn't mess with her like Bitch did during the fight against Dragon. Bitch is clearly irritated by this reminder but does not challenge Taylor. Lisa returns to the room, having finished her phonecall regarding Cherish. She informs those who didn't know that Cherish is being held in an upturned boat's hold in the Boat Graveyard and that Cherish will strike a deal to give information on Siberian and the Nine if she can talk to the group for two minutes. Various people agree that this is a bad idea because Cherish could reveal some kind of hidden information that would cause a divide in the groups, however Lisa insists that she is confident there is something Cherish knows they will miss if they find out the information at a later time. The groups do not know if there is secret will be devasting for Cherish to reveal without someone confessing as such, so Lisa comes up with a way to check. Lisa acquires a book and proposes that they pass it around and each tear out a page, crumpling it or elsewise making it impossible to tell who picked which page. The higher the number somebody selects, the worse their possible secrets are. She sets a benchmark of any number under 150 being embaressing but tolerable, with the last page 355 being the worst possible, and if the numbers are sufficiently low they will agree to contact Cherish. With the agreement of all present, the book is passed around. Taylor chooses 160 due to the possibility of her willingness to fight against Coil being revealed. Lisa reveals the pages that were chosen, with five of them exceedng 150: 155,160,175,222 and 325. Lisa quickly assesses this to be a no to the Cherish deal, however she calls up Cherish to negotiate. Cherish agrees to keep the deal if the Travelers leave the room, and Lisa points out that the Travelers are more afraid of their teammates' opinions on them while the Undersiders would be more concerned by other people knowing their secrets. Alec lends credence to this by revealing he chose page 222 because he assumed the Travelers would be bothered by his secrets, but the Undersiders know enough already. Everyone agrees to this plan and the Travelers leave the room. Lisa calls up Cherish and puts her on loudspeaker. Cherish quickly begins talking about Alec's history of rape, slow murder and usage of drugs in other people's bodies, although Alex argues he was young and Cherie is just as bad. Cherish questions how much youth excuses these actions. She moves on to Brian, explaining that Bonesaw is already planning how to disassemble him again in an even more painful way, clearly disturbing Brian. Her attempts to tell Bitch that Skitter will betray her again fail due to Bitch's hatred of manipulation attempts. Cherish's two minutes run out and she proceeds to reveal that Siberian does indeed have a real body, a middle aged man. Both Siberian and the real body are near Crater Lake, hunting one of the candidates. Cherish refuses to specify which candidate, but does reveal it to be one of the two heroes and urges the Undersiders to hurry up and save them. As the Undersiders prepare to leave, Skitter notices Bitch is clearly exceptionally angry and that Tattletale has pocketed the book pages for later study. Tattletale asks if Skitter is going to be okay for this task, since she is most suited for locating Siberian's real body. Skitter affirms that she will deal somehow. Characters The Undersiders *Grue *Skitter *Tattletale *Bitch **Bastard **Bentley **Sirius *Imp *Regent Travelers *Trickster *Ballistic *Sundancer Slaughterhouse Nine *Cherish *Siberian's Master (Postulated) **Siberian Site Navigation Category:Chapters